Rocky Mountain Front

A new survey by a Colorado-based pollster, commissioned by the Wilderness Society, found that Montanans favor, by a 3 to 1 margin, a Rocky Mountain Front conservation plan that includes more wilderness.

The Rocky Mountain Heritage Act, unveiled in September by the Coalition to Protect the Rocky Mountain Front, proposes to add protection to 393,000 acres.

A plan that proposes to add a new layer of protection to 307,000 acres along the Rocky Mountain Front, while adding 86,000 acres in six chunks to the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex, was unveiled Wednesday.

The Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act is an agreement hammered out during the past three years mainly by people who live along the Front, according to members of the Coalition to Protect the Rocky Mountain Front.

Two decades after then-President Ronald Reagan vetoed a statewide Montana wilderness bill, retired U.S. Forest Service officials and others are urging the state's congressional delegation to take a shot at getting another bill passed by Congress.

"This letter is but another indication that Montanans are trying to jumpstart legislative consideration of wilderness designation," said former Montana Congressman Pat Williams.